Obama the Post Turtle

[WD-40]

I just want my 'free shiit'! I'm tired of having to 'work' for a living. Vote Democrat!

[ProfessorDreadNaught]

If you haven't yet read the book "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" I recommend you do so. Rich people, by and large get so by purchasing assets (and maintaining them) and balancing debt (liabilities). Rich people do NOT sit on money in banks and hoard it. They spend it on items that can generate more money. Speaking as a person started out working for small business owners who became rich and am now working the same method to financial independence, it seems to me most of you don't understand what it is to be either poor or rich. You have a notion of what the "other guy" is like and you want to throw simpleton solutions at a massively complex system.

I won't go writing a massively long explanation on why these seemingly simple solutions are all doomed to failure. I won't write paragraphs explaining why a financial crash of unheard of proportions is inevitable if our economic train doesn't switch tracks soon. No massive treatise on why the poor and the middle class are REALLY to blame for it. I'll only say that NO president since the problem arose has either recognized the issues or made the increasingly hard demands of the American people necessary to fix it.

You could say Ford and Carter didn't see it. Reagan and Bush Sr. tried things to avoid the consequences and to varying degrees it worked and it didn't. Clinton rode the rise of the Internet using the retail economy setup by Reagan and Bush Sr. then converted to "Home Ownership drives Consumer Spending" economy that Bush Jr. tries to ride for a while. This translates into a "Financial Services" economy and that is where we are today. Obama feeds the economy he has (one increasingly like Europe) instead of doing what is necessary to return to a self-sustaining balance that emerging economies half a world away enjoy today. Hope and change. Nope, don't see any of it.

Exploit the poor! It gives them a chance to rise above it. Grow the middle class. It gives them something to do other than mess with things they can't understand. The rich can be rich without having to hide in shame for being intelligent and prudent.

[Mandalore]

That was easily one of the most arrogant and condescending things I've ever read. And I'm including my own thoughts in that group.

[WD-40]

That was easily one of the most arrogant and condescending things I've ever read. And I'm including my own thoughts in that group.

Yeah Dread! Well said!

[MATTHEW'S_DAD]

That is a good book Dread and I do understand what constitutes rich vs. poor. The people I work for are very well off and I have watched them do some amazing things with their money. I also know that the more it cost them to do business because of regulations, the more it cost me, ie - raises, bonuses, hiring, etc. There is a domino effect with money and those dominoes only fall in one direction, down. I don't think some of these guys understand that and they may NEVER understand that. They're going to sit around all their lives with their hands out waiting for you and I to come to the rescue. They can wait forever for all I care, I'm ready to go wait tables for .25 a day in Galt's Gulch if they'll have me.

[Mandalore]

I love how everyone acts like all of us who earn under 40k per year line up for miles for welfare. Get off your [m'kay] high horse, you mother [m'kay] pigs. Most of us work hard for next to nothing. My mother earns around 33k (she is an auditor) and she is a single mother of two. We get by, but we aren't out buying gold plated deca-core computers, if you know what I mean. The problem with our system is not that the poor are [m'kay] up, but that the system is [m'kay] up the poor. Do you know how hard it is for people like me to go to a good college, just through sheer cost? I qualified for a school that offered me 27k/34k tuition (room and board included) that is in a triumvirate system with University of Chicago (ranked sixth in the world) and NorthWestern (ranked somewhere in the high 20s to low 30s world wide) but I still am unable to afford to attend there for four years. And to advance in today's society without a college diploma would be quite the endeavor for someone of my generation. (You [derriere orifice] got lucky, seeing as the generation previous to you exploded the [m'kay] out of any competition).
Secondly, no one in their right mind is advocating taxing the rich at a 99.9% rate. But having a scaled tax system is preferable, given the economic distribution of wealth. Also, we aren't advocating high taxation rates of small businesses, but look at GE. It's a multi-billion dollar business. It actually made a profit off of taxes. How is that even [m'kay] possible? (Loop holes, is how it's possible) And how do churches get away without taxes? I really want to know the answer to that one, for a religion that claims to be the protector of the poor, they sure seem rather fussy about paying their god damn share.

Do you want to know what exploiting the poor gets you? It gets you a lot of pissed off mother [m'kay] who end up annihilating the aristocratic class.

[ProfessorDreadNaught]

I love how everyone acts like all of us who earn under 40k per year line up for miles for welfare. Get off your [m'kay] high horse, you mother [m'kay] pigs. Most of us work hard for next to nothing. My mother earns around 33k (she is an auditor) and she is a single mother of two. We get by, but we aren't out buying gold plated deca-core computers, if you know what I mean. The problem with our system is not that the poor are [m'kay] up, but that the system is [m'kay] up the poor. Do you know how hard it is for people like me to go to a good college, just through sheer cost? I qualified for a school that offered me 27k/34k tuition (room and board included) that is in a triumvirate system with University of Chicago (ranked sixth in the world) and NorthWestern (ranked somewhere in the high 20s to low 30s world wide) but I still am unable to afford to attend there for four years. And to advance in today's society without a college diploma would be quite the endeavor for someone of my generation. (You [derriere orifice] got lucky, seeing as the generation previous to you exploded the [m'kay] out of any competition).
Secondly, no one in their right mind is advocating taxing the rich at a 99.9% rate. But having a scaled tax system is preferable, given the economic distribution of wealth. Also, we aren't advocating high taxation rates of small businesses, but look at GE. It's a multi-billion dollar business. It actually made a profit off of taxes. How is that even [m'kay] possible? (Loop holes, is how it's possible) And how do churches get away without taxes? I really want to know the answer to that one, for a religion that claims to be the protector of the poor, they sure seem rather fussy about paying their god damn share.

Do you want to know what exploiting the poor gets you? It gets you a lot of pissed off mother [m'kay] who end up annihilating the aristocratic class.

Perfect demonstration of what I'm talking about. What you make a year does NOT determine if you are poor or not. Also, you fail to grasp the SCOPE of today's economics. 40K isn't poor. 12K isn't poor. Less than 5500 is poor.

You dolt, you now compete against workers making $15 a day. Just because they don't live here doesn't mean they don't get to sell theIr stuff to you. It also means that a "rich" person will more likely invest his money in endeavors that employ THOSE workers instead of you. REGARDLESS of your degree. Most items manufactured and purchased are not made by college grads or even high school grads. Much of the designing and engineering is going away too because when an Indian or Chinese or Sri-Lankin student gets his degree from Purdue (with much better grades than you btw) he goes back home with a college buddies $50K loan and starts a manufacturing plant that employs 60-100 and uses himself as chief designer/engineer. They manufacture roadway reflectors for the U.S. government and can do it cheaper than U.S. companies because wages are so low (people EXCITED about $15 a day) and environmental laws allow them to handle the toxic fluorescent materials less safely/costly.

I've said it before. The U.S. has a population of approx 300 Million. India has a population of 1.5 Billion. more than 700 Million are living and working for LESS THAN $15 a day. Not to be cruel but, what is so special about your mom in her job that she should get paid 4-5 times what another worker would kiss my feet to do at the lower wage? Skin color? Language? Place of birth. That is all. When I review potential employees for a job opening I evaluate if the person can do the job, what their attitude toward work is and what it will cost for one employee versus another. If 2 applicants are equally qualified for a position, I don't look at their skin color, their sex, religion or sexual orientation. I pick the one which will cost less.

Bottom line, get your head out of your backside and LEARN HOW TO BE RICH! Too lazy to read the book? The principle is simple. Here it is. Ready?

Do work. For anybody. Do anything. It doesn't er. DON'T spend the money you earn on anything but buying things that will earn more money.

That's it. That's the principle. It is NOT easy in practice and difficult to get started. It works, it's actually, the ONLY thing that works, long term. Rich people have the discipline to do it. A rich person has "Assets" that earn enough money to cover their "Expenses/Liabilities" so that any money they earn working (at anything) can be used to buy more/better/improve assets to allow for more expenses/liabilities. THAT is a rich person. It's NOT about the $ figure. It's about the freedom to work without worrying about what you are being paid.

[MATTHEW'S_DAD]

Mandy, I have a 2 year degree in criminal justice from the local community college, certainly not fancy. The U.S. Army paid for it and then some. I sell HVAC stuff to people that range from rednecks to orientals and Mexicans that speak little to no English. I see people from all walks of life that try and start a business and some succeed and most fail. The ones that succeed reinvest their earnings into making more earnings. The ones that fail generally blow their money on cars, trucks, boats, etc. I've been watching this cycle of business now for 20+ years and am very qualified to speak about it. So what does any of this mean?

1 You don't have to be rich to get rich
2 You don't need an education to be rich
3 If you really want that education, we have a hell of a tuition program here in the states (military)
4 If you have a little drive and commitment in what you do for a living, then you can make something out of it.
5 Reinvest in yourself and your business or prepare to fail

So you know, some of these blue collar HVAC guys that I deal with....they are what I would call rich (vacation homes, retiring@48 years old, etc). It ain't all investment bankers and lawyers out there.

I reiterate, I want the people that I work for to be rich. That sentiment seems to work well for me and my family. The better things are for my employers, the better things are for me.

[Mandalore]

It's a nice [m'kay] principle Dread, I'll give you that.

But here's the difference between India and the United States. Cost of living. An Indian can get by making $15 a day. In the United States, you can not. So you pull your head out of your ass. Also, how the hell are you blaming the poor/middle class of the developed world when the means of production are controlled primarily by the aristocrats (read:wealthy). Also, if you were going to use the term poor in a clearly defined manner instead of a colloquial one, you should have invoked the use of the poverty line. How you can compare wages and SOls between a nation that has been industrialized for nearly a century and one that is still developing is beyond me when you say that we (the industrialized nation) should accept wages that would make it impossible for them to live in the current economic situation. If your goal is to turn America into a developing country, go ahead, you and your ilk are well on their [m'kay] way to making that happen. Essentially what you're saying is that the ultimate maximization of profits is preferable even when it ultimately ruins the economic system of a nation. It's this sort of short sightedness that ultimately leads to the economic ruin of nations.

The case you mention is exactly the argument I'm using. In India there is opportunity for the poor. In America, there is not. And the system you describe is primarily the reasoning behind this. In India, having a degree from Purdue will put you on top, in America it makes you normal. He can afford to take out that 60k loan because in India he will soon be a millionaire. All because the means of production held by the wealthy have shifted their focus off of domestic labor and onto foreign labor, all for the ever mighty dollar.

And MD, since you talk such a big talk buddy, I really want to see you survive on .25 an hour. Assuming a 40 hour work week and that you work 52 weeks a year, that's $520 to support your family. Do it without welfare too, you big strapping ideological warrior you!

[MATTHEW'S_DAD]

That was me wanting the .25 a day. Read a book...

(hint - google Galt's Gulch)